Monday wasn't the first time Bill Keller referred to cyncism bred by Fox News. |
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In part because of this, the Times’s damaging investigative reporting on the News Corp-owned News of the World phone-hacking scandal, which continues to resound through the media and political worlds in the UK, raised a few eyebrows, including some at News Corp.

After the Times published its story, Bill Akass, the managing editor of The News of the World, objected, accusing the Times of using its journalism to attack a business rival.

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”It stretches credulity to believe the decision to devote such resources to investigate an old story was an impartial act, uninfluenced by competitive rivalry,” he said.

The Times’s public editor, Arthur Brisbane, devoted a column to the charges, in which Keller defended the story, saying he and the other Times editors knew that the paper would use “this dubious argument” as its first line of defense.

”It was at least in the back of our minds that because Mr. Murdoch has declared war on The New York Times, a story centered on one of his newspapers had to bend over backwards to be seen as fair,” Keller told Brisbane. “In my view, the process was thorough and scrupulous.”

A few Times insiders wondered whether an earlier incarnation of the Times would have charged ahead on the story so forcefully, since the accusations that the Times was acting in its business interest would be hard to avoid.

But in an email to POLITICO last fall, Keller pointed to the Times’ long history of aggressive media reporting, which was tough on Murdoch before he declared war on the Times.

A 2007 two-part series took a hard and not always flattering look at Murdoch’s attempts to break into the Chinese market and lobby for favor on Capitol Hill, for example. And a January 2010 profile of Fox News chief Roger Ailes made news with a quote from British PR guru Matthew Freud, Murdoch’s son-in-law, saying, “I am by no means alone within the family or the company in being ashamed and sickened by Roger Ailes’s horrendous and sustained disregard of the journalistic standards that News Corporation, its founder and every other global media business aspires to.”

With Keller’s comments on Monday, he put himself squarely in Freud’s camp, and among those who regard Fox News as the barbarians at the gate.

But there have been times when Ailes’s news judgment bested Keller’s, by his own admission. The most famous of these was the ACORN scandal, which Fox News covered early and often and the Times all but ignored in the early days.

The episode prompted a column from public editor Clark Hoyt containing mea culpas from both Keller and Times managing editor Jill Abramson.

Abramson said the Times had been “slow off the mark” on the ACORN story, and blamed “insufficient tuned-in-ness to the issues that are dominating Fox News and talk radio.” She and Keller said they would assign an editor to monitor opinion media – particularly, we can assume, of the right-wing variety — and brief them on any scandals that they should be paying attention to.

I listen to liberal radio because i believe in hearing both sides of the argument. The hypocrisy is unbelievable. The hatred that spews from these liberal radio hosts is far worse then anything i have seen/heard on Fox.

chicagosprogressivetalk.com/

It is very obvious Stephanie Miller has some serious daddy issues.

"A former stand-up comedienne, Miller has always been vocally pro-gay, both on her show and in public. She grew up with two Republican parents, including her late father, attorney and congressman William Miller, who was Barry Goldwater's running mate in the 1964 presidential election."

Why are all the liberal voice boxes former comedians?

What is it about liberals and comedians?

The best comics become the equivalent of conmen, Professor Wiseman adds. “Comedians have to give the illusion of spontaneity. My guess would be that they would be good liars. Because you almost have to surprise yourself with the punchline, even though you know what it is.”

No one with an IQ over 60 could take anything Bill Keller says seriously.

Keller is bitter because the NYT and network news no longer enjoys a complete monopoly on the news and their sinking viewer numbers reflect that given a choice, more and more choose true "fair and balanced" news. .

The NYT is simply just a little more subtle than Keith Olberman. They still tow the left wing line. And we know it..

Anyone who believes anything written in the New York Slimes these days needs to leave the free Wi Fi section of Starbucks, get off their Macbook, quit sipping the triple skinny decaf latte and read Gray Lady Down by William McGowan

The NYT was just not used to ever being challenged in its biased reporting and progressive activism over the years. Many of NYT supposedly hard news stories contain disguised editorial comment on Page One.

Seriously POLITICO? You're giving kudos to Roger Ailes and FOX News for aggressively covering the "ACORN scandal" when the NYTimes didn't run after that fishy-looking story?

Are we talking about the same ACORN "scandal" that was based on the right-wing flacking of heavily edited video that we now know was manipulated for the specific purpose of hurting ACORN, a respected community organization?

Hell, FOX was probably right in the middle of that "scandal," but their involvement should bring them (more) shame and disrepute, not a favorable comparison to the Times.

The Times was right to refrain from running after that hoax video, and they were wrong to have apologized for exercising good judgement in that regard. Shame on you POLITICO.

The America people have become cynical. Cynical about national news media that does not provide complete facts or only half truths. Cynical about politicians that make many promises only to feather their and their cronies' nests. Cynical about Eastern establishment types who laugh at the rubes outside their circles. Cynical about financial markets run in collusion with large financial houses and their puppets in government. Cynical about judges and justice departments that are dismantling our way of life.

What Bull, the Times has always had a special place in the liberal heart by creating the news not reporting on it. If they were to go away we would not know for about 6 months. Do they have any readers left?

How typical of the MSM and the “Professional Left” to hijack the Political discourse and assign blame as they see fit. They never seem to view themselves as the provocateurs of the very narrative they constantly condemn.

“I think the effect of Fox News on American public life has been to create a level of cynicism about the news in general,” Keller said. “It has contributed to the sense that they are all just out there with a political agenda, but Fox is just more overt about it. And I think that’s unhealthy.”

Translation here is that he thinks we little people aren't smart enough to figure it out when The Times does it. Uh...doesn't the New York Times still have more readers than Fox has viewers? And we've all seen what a bunch of angry little brats their liberal readers and combative writers like Maureen Lowd are. Maybe the Times is making people more cynical. Or is just "being passionate" when libs do it? Fox News is where topics get debated but in typical liberal fashion Mr. Keller runs to a comfortable venue where he won't have his opinions challenged.

What's wrong Mr. Keller? Don't want to debate O'Rielly on his show? What are you scared of?

No one in the news media is more "overt in its political agenda" than the New York Times. The bias is eveident from the front page news to the editorials and eve in the food section. It is this biased reporting which has caused the cynicism about the news media in general and the New York Times in particular. It has also caused the continuing decline of this formerly great newspaper and the growing number of FOX viewers. I used to read the Times daily. Now I may look at it once or twice a year and laugh.